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Buddhism Arrives in China
Fah-hian
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OVERVIEW
In his book about his pilgrimage to India, from A.D. 399 to 414, the Chinese Buddhist
monk Fah-hian (Fa-hsien, Faxian) included the following description of how he believed
Buddhism had arrived in China from India. Information in the footnotes was of course
supplied by the modern translator.
GUIDED READING As you read, consider the following questions:
• What do you learn about religious pilgrimages from this passage?
• Why do you think the author concludes that the “diffusion of the law of Buddha
was no human work”?
K
eeping along the incline of the Tsung Ling Mountains, in a southwesterly1 direction, they travelled onwards for fifteen days. The road is
difficult and fatiguing. Steep crags and precipices constantly intercept the way.
These mountains are like walls of rock, standing up 10,000 ft. in height. On
looking over the edge the sight becomes confused, and then, on advancing, the
foot loses its hold and you are lost. At the base there is a stream called the Sinto (Indus). Men of old days have cut away the cliff so as to make a passage,
and have carved out against the rock steps for descent, amounting altogether
to 700 in number. Having passed these, there is, suspended across the river, a
bridge of ropes, by which travellers pass over it. From one side of the river to
the other is eighty paces. According to the records of Kau Yih, neither Chang
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Kian nor Kan Ying of the Han dynasty, reached so far as this. All the priests
asked Fah Hian what he knew as to the time when the law of Buddha began to
spread eastward from their country. Hian replied, "On enquiry, men of those
lands agreed in saying, that, according to an ancient tradition, Shamans from
India began to carry the sacred books of Buddha beyond the river, from the
time when the image of Maitreya Bodhisatwa was set up." Now this image was
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set up 300 years or so after the Nirvana of Buddha, which corresponds with
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the time of Pingwang, of the Chau Family. Hence it may be said that the
diffusion of the great doctrine may be attributed to the influence of this image.
For apart from the power of the great teacher Maitrêya, following in the
footsteps of Sakya, who would have been sufficient to cause the knowledge of
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the three precious ones to be spread so far, that even men on the outskirts of
the world acquired that knowledge? We may conclude, therefore, with
certainty, that the origin of this diffusion of the law of Buddha was no human
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work, but sprang from the same cause as the dream of Ming Ti.
Copyright © by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
Buddhism Arrives in China
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1
A south-easterly direction would be more likely, yet the difficulties of the
road, and the windings of the mountains, would perhaps account for any
uncertainty of the course.
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Chang Kian was a Chinese general who lived in the reign of Wou-ti of
the Han dynasty, B.C. 122. He conducted the first memorable expedition of
his nation into Central Asia (vide Rémusat)
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Kan Ying lived in the year 97 A.D. He was sent as far as the Caspian Sea,
to subjugate the Roman empire. As he heard, however, that with an
unfavourable wind it would take two years to cross that sea, he returned
without accomplishing his object (R).
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That is, the Eastern Han dynasty, which lasted from A.D. 25 to A.D. 190.
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The Nirvana, that is the death, of Buddha occurred, according to the Pali
Annals of Ceylon, 543 B.C.
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770 B.C.
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The three precious ones, that is, Buddha, Dharma, Sañgha; or Buddha,
the Law, and the Church.
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Ming Ti, the second emperor of the Eastern Han dynasty, began to reign
A.D. 58.
Copyright © by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
Buddhism Arrives in China
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